Alan Harris reading

seeing you

by Alan Harris

when I look you
in the eye I find
history and mystery
not to be known
even as your own eye
presses me like a white
daytime moon nudging
soft against an open sky
right in front of outer space
leading to everything else
that flies and falls including
any flying-falling maple seed to bring
an unfoldment of up and down
(now don't the sprawling-upward limbs
and thirsty spreading-downward roots
trace out a delicate explosion so slow
so sweet that the tree has to yes die
to go bare
to fall
to rot
to sleep
to have been all of
what a tree is
all of?)
but how I look at you
my very alter-life
is as moon over healthy tree
at play in sunlight
in behind your eye
behind your inner eye
behind the innerness of your inner eye
behind even behindness
all the way back to
here I am across a table
from your most amazing being
wondering if you see
what journey is behind me
all the way to here